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Watari - aka Quillsh Wammy - is L's 'handler' in Death Note. He is also the founder of the Wammy chain of orphanages, including The Wammy House for Gifted and Talented Orphans.

Also known as Wammy's House, this was the institution which raised L, Near, Mello, Matt, Beyond Birthday, Linda et al. It is located in Winchester, England.

We first meet Mr Wammy under his guise as Watari, an anonymous figure clad from head to toe in a black leather trench coat complete with Fedora hat. He infiltrated a meeting of Interpol, wherein representatives of the world's law enforcement agencies had convened to discuss the Kira case. Watari was carrying a laptop from which emerged the electronic voice of L to address them all.

Later, as the Kira Task Force are invited to meet L and vetted by the same, Watari appears again, this time in the suited guise of his actual self - Quillsh Wammy, benefactor of the Wammy Group chain of orphanages and the man who trained L to become a detective.

He now facilitates his ward in his work solving crimes, acting as a handler, spokesperson or kind of butler. Noted mostly for organizing logistics of manoeuvres ordered by L; transferring the funds to pay for the same; and bringing copious amounts of cakes, sweets and other sugary things for L to consume whilst puzzling over his cases.

Elsewhere, it transpires that Wammy is a crack marksmanship, as well as highly skilled in espionage. He made his considerable wealth as an inventor.

Killed in the line of duty, during the fight against Kira, Quillsh Wammy is remembered as a 'great man' by members of the Task Force, lauded as the same by newspaper obituaries around the world.

Yet there is a darkness that hides beneath the surface of this seemingly amenable, altruistic man. As author Tsugumi Ohba put it, 'He's a guy who cultivates detectives for fun. That's kind of terrible, isn't it?' (How to Read: Death Note 13, pg 27). Well, in anybody's language, that's child trafficking and rendition, at the very least.

The Names of Quillsh Wammy

Death Note's Watari is alternatively known as:

キルシュ・ワイミーQuillsh WammyQuillish WammyKirushu WaimīKirsch-WaimiMr Wammy

ワタリWatariW渡真名Wye Me

Originally, Ohba meant to call this character Shadow, as in L's shadow - a moniker with more than one inferred meaning, which fan-fiction writers would have had great fun exploring. However Death Note's editor pooh-poohed the name, telling Ohba, 'No, no! Anything but that!' Hence the author coming up with Watari, which he explained meant 'handler' in Japanese.

The Auguries of Quillsh Wammy

Wammy's birth date of May 1st 1933 (manga) also factors into Shēngxiào. He is a Rooster in the Chinese Zodiac

However, the time-slip of the anime would have him born in 1936 instead. That means that now in the Chinese Zodiac Watari is a Rat

How to Read: Death Note 13 reveals that Quillsh Wammy's blood group is B

A Versatile Fixer - The Personality of Quillsh Wammy

Death Note 13: How to Read gives us an insight into the character of Quillsh Wammy, at least insofar as his author saw him.

The older man scores highly for versatility, talent, initiative/willingness to act, motivation and emotional strength. Not far behind are his only slightly lesser scores for creativity, social skills and intelligence. That he doesn't reach the topmost figure for creativity is a little surprising, given that Wammy made his fortune as an inventor. The ultimate creator, one might think, this side of actual divinity.

We do get a hint of the kind of things that Wammy invented, when he turns up in the Death Note manga with belts containing panic buttons. Not exactly Bond's Q, but in the ballpark.

As befits a man whose wealth and life has become devoted to raising children, his pet hate is 'dirty rooms'. Presumably plenty of those at Wammy's House. I can't quite see the like of Beyond Birthday, Mello and Near running around with a duster.

This is an attribute taken to extreme levels in the Death Note TV drama, wherein guests are sprayed with disinfection at the door. The interior of L's headquarters is kept pristine in its cleanliness, with Watari hurrying in to exchange L's shirt should a mere splash of food stain hit upon it. In most tellings of the Death Note story, it's also inferred that Wammy is a fabulous cook. At least there doesn't seem to be any travelling caterer providing all that confectionery for L that his handler regularly delivers.

Though it's nowhere stated that Wammy is an Englishman, it's implied in the location of his main orphanage for the training of gifted and talented orphans - Winchester, in England. A further clue is given in his most favourite thing in the world - Earl Grey tea.

It's never truly explained how Watari managed to become such a crack marksman either. His sharp-shooting is such that, in the Death Note manga and anime alike, he's able to fire a bullet which blasts a gun from the hand of Yotsuba's Kyosuke Higuchi, far below him on the ground. Wammy himself hovering over the scene in a helicopter at the time.

Nor do we learn where Quillsh Wammy acquired such skill in espionage, though he puts that to good use in Death Note, infiltrating various organizations to gain or deliver information. Not least a gathering of Interpol.

Nevertheless he passed on all this knowledge, and the thinking/morality behind it, to the children in his care. Maybe more clues to Watari's character reside in those he raised - how they turned out and what became of them.

Complete List of Wammy Kids in Death Note Canon

Genius children taken from wherever they lived around the world and installed in Wammy's House, Winchester. Here their 'special talents' were cultivated with a top class education, whereupon they were sent back out into the world to put those skills into practice. All of these individuals were nurtured by Wammy - or at least had their upbringing and training overseen remotely by him, as warden Roger Ruvie took orders from above.

J- Name UnknownAppears only as character ina DS Death Note game.(L: The Prologue to Death Note)

M- Mello (Mihael Keehl)Joined the Mafia in a bid to catch Kira and succeed to the L title before Near did. When unsuccessful, he gave his life to help Near defeat Kira.(Death Note manga/anime)

Letter Unknown- Matt (Mail Jeevas)Third ranked Wammy kid at the time of L's death. Matt ultimately stepped into the Kira case at the behest of Mello. He was gunned down and killed by Kira supporters.(Death Note manga/anime)

R- Name UnknownShown on L's call/mailing list. However the name is faded out to grey, implying that R is dead. (B's is the same hue.)(L: Change the World)

V- Name UnknownShown on L's call/mailing list. However the name is faded out to grey, implying that V is dead. (B's is the same hue.)(L: Change the World)

B- Beyond BirthdayTried to lure L out with a series of grisly murders in Los Angeles; impersonated L for Naomi Misora, before setting fire to himself in a failed suicide attempt; imprisoned in LA, where he suffered a heart-attack and died (presumably killed by Kira) on January 21st 2004.(Another Note: The Los Angeles BB Murder Cases)

F- Name unknownRescued Near from a remote village, where all were dying in a deliberate epidemic, and sent him to L. F was killed in Thailand when a US helicopter shoots down his trunk. However F was already infected with a deadly virus.(L: Change the World)

K- Kimiko KujoScientist - unleashed a deadly virus in her own bid to 'change the world' by wiping out its human population.(L: Change the World)

N- Near (Nate River)Mathematical genius, who de facto succeeded L at age twelve, when the latter was killed by Rem/Kira. With clues provided by Mello's martyrdom to the cause, Near was able to finally defeat Kira in the name of himself, Mello and L, ergo Wammy's House.(Death Note manga/anime)

Random Wammy kidsas seen in Death Note: Relight (above) and Death Note manga (left)

D- Name UnknownShown on L's call/mailing list(L: Change the World)

G- Name UnknownShown on L's call/mailing list(L: Change the World)

L- L LawlietApparently the prototype 'special talent' Wammy orphan, for whom all the rest were raised as back-ups or successors.

At eight years old, L could beat up the other orphans in Wammy's House. He also discovered the delight in solving true crime cases, and thwarted the Winchester Mad Bomber. Beyond that he made his name as not only the world's greatest detective but, under pseudonyms, the 2nd and 3rd ranked too.

He was killed during the Kira case.

Letter Unknown- LindaBecame a successful artist. During the Kira case, she drew images of Near and Mello for the Japanese Task Force.(Death Note manga/anime)

Q- Name UnknownShown on L's call/mailing list(L: Change the World)

T- Name UnknownShown on L's call/mailing list. However the name is faded out to grey, implying that T is dead. (B's is the same hue.)(L: Change the World)

Each skilled Wammy kid set loose on the world was assigned a letter by Watari. In L: Change the World, it's stated that this only occurs with the greatest, most intelligent of the Wammy's House outcrop. Kujo is according stunned to belatedly realise that she was afforded the letter K.

Dotted across various adaptations of canon, we've practically got the entire alphabet in Wammy Letters. With Watari himself indicated by the Letter W, only H, I, O, S and U are missing. However, some known Wammy alumni never divulge their letters. We don't, for example, know which Matt was assigned, despite him being third in the Wammy House rankings. Nor yet do we know which letter Ryūzaki will take in the forthcoming movie Death Note 2016, assuming that he takes one at all.

Meanwhile, by the end of the manga/anime Death Note stories, Near interchangeably uses both N and L. The latter earned post-Kira. Thus giving an insight into the fact that letters can be taken from their peers by successful rivals/successors from the same Institution. This is a system that Wammy himself must have set up.

Along with a code of ethics that apparently accounts for serial killers, abductors, biomedical scientists bent on mass destruction and the propensity of Wammy graduates to think it proper to die - or be killed - for want of a puzzle's solution.

The Faces of Watari

Quillsh Wammy Death Note manga

Quillsh Wammy Death Note anime

Quillsh Wammy Death Note Nintendo game

Quillsh Wammy Death Note: Relight

Posted as Part of

While we're all familiar with the movie L Change the World - even those who wish they weren't - even long-standing Death Note fans might have missed the fact that Matsuda got his own short film in relation to it. As these stills from the ten minute movie attest:

Broadcast on Japanese television, initially on February 8th 2008, Spin-Off Matsuda was basically made up of scenes deleted from the movie itself. It followed the fortunes of Touta Matsuda in a story which ran concurrently with those seen with L, Maki and Near.

It starred Sōta Aoyama as Matsuda, reprising his role from the other live-action movies in the trilogy (soon to be quartet).

As with the main movie L Change the World, Kiyomi Fujii wrote the screenplay. The spin-off covers Matsuda's issues with filing a final Kira case report, and a poignant meeting with L a fortnight before the latter's known and inevitable death.

Spin-Off Matsuda: L Change the World Special and Synopsis

The most common copy of Spin-Off Matsuda available on the internet is embedded here - in Japanese with Thai sub-titles.

There are no versions with English sub-titles on-line (or may not have even been made), but a brief synopsis runs like this:

Touta Matsuda's signature is required upon a document concluding the Kira case. He waivers over signing, because he's not sure that the case should be closed. He can't get his head around what precisely Light believed with regard to justice, nor what L did to thwart him.

Soichiro Yagami pre-empted this and left a note for Matsuda stating, 'Go see Ryuzaki'. So Matsuda goes to visit L, carrying with him a gift - a box of cakes.

L gratefully receives them with the comment, "A farewell gift to a person going for death. I shall thank you."

This incenses Matsuda, who can't understand why L continues to work, when he only has two weeks left to live. "Stop working!" He rants, "Do anything you like, such as dating with a girl, or travelling anywhere you like, whatever. Why don't you spend the rest of your time for yourself! At least do not pretend dying is no big deal!"

Once he's calmed down, Matsuda is contrite about his behaviour. He calls Soichiro and apologizes for being mean to Ryuzaki.

Just on it, a delivery man brings a gift from L - a basket of crepes with the message, 'Sugar will improve your brain function. Eat lots of crepes to become clever - YOU IDIOT!'

Matsuda exclaims, "L, you Hyottoko guy!" (Hyottoko being the mask worn by L in the movies.) And stands there eating, crying and pondering on how L can bear knowing that he only has 23 days left to live, yet still carry on.

The movie short ends with Matsuda crouched in the street, overwhelmed by the sentiment and his emotion, dwarfed by the architecture of the city around him.

The recently announced stars of Death Note 2016 - Sōsuke Ikematsu, Masahiro Higashide and Masaki Suda - have been commenting on their new roles.

Masahiro, who is playing Death Note researcher and investigator Tsukuru Mishima, notes that he's grown up knowing this story. Therefore it's difficult not to be influenced by what has gone before; nor to avoid the pressure in getting it right.

He views the latest story as a three-way, intertwined battle between geniuses. He is enjoying making the movie and hopes that we enjoy watching it, including those discovering the story for the first time now.

'New L' Sōsuke - aka Ryūzaki - is also feeling the pressure: to live up to the legacy left by Ken'ichi Matsuyama in the earlier movies. He feels excited about filming and notes that every day the cast are directed in exceeding the standard of the day before.

This new Death Note story, he feels, contains the central message that human beings are weak and foolish creatures.

Masaki equally remembers when he was in the audience watching earlier Death Note live-action films. That makes it all the more thrilling to be starring in one now.

He sees in his own legacy a hint of Mello and Near in the original manga, insofar as his cyber-terrorist Kira worshipper character Yūgi Shion - plus the parts played by the other two - represent the successors, heirs or children of Light and L. This is the movie equivalent of a Death Note second arc.

He hopes that their 'second half' story will surpass expectations laid down by the first wave of Japanese live-action Death Note movies ten years ago.

Personally they would have had my (tentative) vote straight out, if they'd just HAD Mello in one of these live-action movies. And I don't mean disguised as a young schoolgirl. We're all looking at you, L: Change the World and Maki.

US live action Death Note director Adam Wingard, re-reading the Black Edition,as per his Tweet on December 10th 2015

According to the dates given in the anime, Death Note Near's 21st birthday will be celebrated today - both in its canon!universe and throughout the Near fandom too.

Created any Near cosplay, fan-art or fan-fiction to mark his milestone birthday? Leave links in the comments below, so that all might find them.

We know precisely what our new L looks like now - and what will happen to him this year - as Near was twenty-one when we revisited him in the Death Note One-Shot Special (Weekly Shonen Jump, 2008).

There he is above, as drawn in that 46 page manga tale, and again on its cover. An adult Near appearing slimmer and more gaunt, with L like bags under his eyes and white hair touching his shoulders.

Then again the manga dates would have him celebrating his 24th birthday today instead. The events told in the one-shot happened nearly three years ago.

They grow so fast...

Near aged 21 from theDeath Note One-Shot Special

Though I suppose it all depends who for you wears the face of Near, and which source you favour above all the rest as canon. It strikes me that stories can fix a character in space and time, stranding them in a certain aspect and at an unchanging age.

Forever eight, thirteen, or sixteen, seventeen or twenty-one.

As today is Near's birthday, here's a run through the different portrayals of him and how old they pertain to be today.

Near in the Death Note Manga

Born: August 24th 1991Age then: 13 before the time-slip; 17-18 after it; 21 in the one-shotAge today: 24

Admit it, you've never watched beyond the final credits in L: Change the World. I'll admit it. It never occurred to me to continue on.

For some, it's painful enough to get to the credits, let alone sit through them. Particularly when they're not subject to subtitles translating the beautiful kanji sailing past.

Which means that we all missed the semi-secret poignant scene sneaked in there - beyond all acknowledgements, but one.

It depicts L sitting before a desk, upon which lies a lever arch folder, closed over a pile of tidy case-notes. L stares at a photograph of Mr Wammy for long seconds, before stepping from his crouch upon the chair and walking off camera. The scene ends with a black screen, upon which white words form: L Lawliet, Rest in Peace.

He's gone back to Watari. At least that's the only interpretation which salves the heart of onlookers.

So what's this got to do with Mello? For a start, those case-notes. We're not told which ones they pertain to, but my imagination tells me that there are three cases in there and they'll be referenced or retold in the novel Another Note. But that's conjecture.

More blatant is the fact that the sequence begins with a loud snapping of chocolate.

We hear it before we see Lawliet perched in situ. For a instant, we suspect we're about to see a blond Mafioso smirking from the shadows. And perhaps we do, at least in nodding acknowledgement towards those who died in the cause of Kira.

Just look at L in this scene. And smile through your pathos. It was a hint, but we caught it.

Chocolate eating L stares at Watari in theclosing scene from L: Change the World

It's reminiscent of our final glimpse of Near, in the manga, nomming chocolate out of respect for Mello. That acknowledgement was admitted by Ohba in How To Read - the official guide to Death Note. However, we haven't finished with Mello and this movie yet.

There was another obscure Mello hint in the previous final scene of L: Change the World. By that, I mean the last one before the credits, wherein L takes the tiny Thai child to Wammy's House and names him Near.

In Lawliet's little speech to his young mathematical genius companion, he advises him, 'There is one thing I want you to remember, no matter how gifted, you alone cannot change the world.'

Is that not a nod towards Near's own Yellow Box denouncement of Light in the manga? When he said that he alone couldn't surpass L. But with Mello alongside him, they could collectively succeed where L had failed.

The whole scene is reproduced below, though no-one on YouTube - insofar as I can find - has captured that final part beyond the credits with the chocolate.

Is all of this just the rabid ravings of an obsessed fan-girl? You tell me!

Remember how - back in October 2014 - I spent the best part of two days in cyber stores on a seemingly endless hunt for every last Death Note DVD, box set and blu-ray disc?

Nope? Well, I can. I'm still traumatized - randomly twitching in time to all the clicking I did.

After all of that, the last thing I wanted to do was tat with the best formatting for our Death Note store. So I tested out a few, then left it live on-line for feedback purposes.

And promptly forgot all about it.

Ooops! Bit embarrassing really, how ugly that Death Note News page has looked for the past seven months. Sorry about that. I'm a crap business woman, not at all professional, and such things reflect upon us all.

Then again, I've managed to exist for over half a year without having to repetitively click anything which isn't punctuated regularly by a level up screen.

Until yesterday. And today. You really, seriously would not believe how long it takes to hunt down quality Death Note DVD cover images; scale them to the right size; tidy up the ones now horrifically pixelated; then shepherd them all into place. So many hours that I will never see returned.

I know that no-one else in the world cares a jot about this. But care, damn it!

I clicked until insanity threatened, then made a cup of tea and clicked some more. Tinkering with titles to get them all lined up; double-checking URLs; ensuring each were in the correct categories... just don't ASK me about the moment when I accidentally deleted a whole section just completed. *sob*

Then pretend that you've been in at least once during the last seven months, so you can tell the difference and oohhh! in delight and wonder in the comments.

Please. Twitch. Twitch. Twitch. Notice what I did. Madness is just a tea-cup away. Twitch. Love it and if the muse takes you, I'd appreciate the passing on of links and the occasional purchase if there's a gap in your Death Note movie, anime and random stuff collection.